“What’s for dinner tonight?” Mrs. Cone reached out and squeezed Izzy’s fleshy leg. Izzy was wearing a red polka-dot one-piece and looked like a cute little ladybug.
“Pizza!” Izzy said.
Mrs. Cone looked over at me. “You’re making pizza?”
“No, Dr. Cone said this morning that he wanted to order pizza from some place in Rehoboth, so we shouldn’t cook tonight.” I hadn’t grown tired of cooking, but it did seem nice to have the night off.
“Ah, exciting. I haven’t had pizza in ages.” Mrs. Cone patted her stomach. Her bikini was as small as Sheba’s and reminded me of a disassembled net bag. My mother wouldn’t have even considered it a bathing suit.
“What?” Dr. Cone looked up from his book. He’d been completely tuned out.
“Do they deliver or do we pick it up?” Sheba asked. “Maybe we can pick it up and then stop at a boutique and buy a new suit for Mary Jane.”
I was wearing the one-piece I’d been wearing all summer. It had started out orange but had faded to a pale almost-pink color. “I don’t think my mother will let me wear a bikini,” I said.
“Your mother’s not here.” Sheba winked.
“Oh, let’s get a new suit for Mary Jane!” Mrs. Cone said.
“Do I need a new suit?” Izzy asked.
“No, you’re a perfect little ladybug.” I leaned in and kissed Izzy.
“But Mary Jane needs a new suit?”
“I don’t,” I said. “And it’s a waste of money. We only have two more days.”
“It is not a waste of money,” Sheba said. “When you run away from home and move to New York to live with me and Jimmy, you can wear it there.”
“Mary Jane can’t leave me.” Izzy climbed into my lap and I kissed her again. I didn’t want to leave her. And I’d never once thought of leaving my parents before college. But after Sheba had tossed out the idea of running away and living with her and Jimmy, I was momentarily infected with it. Like a fever that lets you see the usual world through the intensity of the unusual.
Dr. Cone called in the pizza and Mrs. Cone, Sheba, Izzy, and I went to pick it up. Jimmy was home by then, so he and Dr. Cone decided to do some work in the Office while we were gone.
Mrs. Cone drove and Sheba sat in the front seat. They were both wearing black pixie wigs and giant sunglasses. Sheba was wearing a terry-cloth shorts jumpsuit that zipped up the front and had a hood. Mrs. Cone was in her jean shorts that showed the white untanned edge of her bottom, and a tank top that revealed the outline of her nipples. Izzy and I wore jean shorts that did not reveal our bottoms and tank tops that did not reveal our nipples.
Mrs. Cone and Izzy went off to pick up the pizzas while Sheba and I went into the Red Crab Boutique. Sheba circled the store, pulling clothes off the racks without even checking the prices. I walked behind her. I didn’t realize she was choosing items for me until she said, “Okay, Mary Jane, in the dressing room.”
I looked at the pile of clothes in Sheba’s arms. On top of the pile was a black crochet bikini that I immediately loved. But I knew I could never wear it in front of my mother, or even at the Elkridge Club when my mother wasn’t there （my mother was always there）。 Crochet was subversive—it was the domain of hippies and pot smokers, and the Age of Aquarius. I really would have to move in with Jimmy and Sheba if I wanted to wear this suit outside of my bedroom.
I opened a dressing room door, Sheba standing behind me.
“Mary Jane!” I jumped. It was Beanie Jones, coming out of the fitting room next to mine. She was holding a silver jumpsuit that looked like liquid mercury. “I was wondering when I’d run into y’all! And the out-of-town guests!” She winked at Sheba as if she were a Cone family insider, and not a stranger to be lied to.
“Good to see you again.” Sheba put on her socialite voice. I wondered if she could remember the name she had come up with when we’d seen Beanie and her husband at Morgan Millard. I couldn’t.
“How did you know we were here?” I asked. Dr. Cone had told us that the Flemings, from whom we had borrowed the house, had sworn not to tell anyone we were staying there.
“I saw your mother at Elkridge and she told me you were staying somewhere on Indian Dunes.” Beanie Jones waved her hand over the pile of clothes in Sheba’s arms. “Are those for you to try on, Mary Jane? That’s a sexy little suit you got there.” She glanced at me, and then winked at Sheba.